


Four O'Clock in Chicago

by magnificentmoose



Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: M/M, Museums, Post-War, Road Trips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-16
Updated: 2018-06-16
Packaged: 2019-05-24 03:38:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14946872
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magnificentmoose/pseuds/magnificentmoose
Summary: When the war is well and truly finished, they go to Chicago.





	Four O'Clock in Chicago

When the war is well and truly finished, they go to Chicago. Of course in between, there is a mountain of paperwork, the departure of the men, and the god damn mess that entails the end of the war. Nix remarks in his own acerbic way that a war only truly begins once the guns have stopped firing.

“Not with a bang, but a whimper,” he tells Dick in and out of the wine cellar induced stupor when they have a moment alone together sometime amidst the chaos of V-E Day. They’re sprawled together in a pile, limbs entangled and the sun just beginning to set over Berchtesgaden.

“Christ, I never liked Eliot that much to begin with.” If he’s being honest with himself, he feels like a two-bit 19th century poet, drunk off his ass with several empty bottles rolling lazily next to him. Beads of red that have managed to escape his lips trickle and melt into his tie. Lew wonders who is going to be sent to clean this place up when the dust finally settles.

“You’re being maudlin, Nix,” says Dick, but he gives him a tired smile anyway, the lines on his face softening. His hair has become slightly unkempt and fluffy, and the warm, fading light halos him in a way that’s almost too ironic for words. He thinks he should mumble some sort of hosanna, but he’s not sure Dick would appreciate it: his breath stinks like the backroom of his favorite bar on Forty-second street and his tongue has been loosened enough.

“Yeah, well we can’t all be Cary Grant, can we? How long do you think we’ll be here?”

“I suppose we’ll have to go down sooner or later. I’m sure the men have been enjoying themselves today.”

“No, I mean…after all of this is over.” He gestures in a slightly exaggerated fashion vaguely towards Berchtesgaden. 

“Oh,” and Dick lets the syllable out in a slow exhale. “I suppose they’ll be shipping us out to the Pacific sooner than later.” A sunbeam bursts bright behind Dick’s head and he turns away. 

They let the silence linger between their bodies for a few moments before Dick drops his head to Nix’s lap and lets it rest there. The movement catches Nix off guard: nothing Dick does is never not premeditated: he wonders if it is possible to simply become inebriated by mere association with a body that is mostly champagne bubbles.

“You know, when we do get back,” he says, breaking the silence that shouldn’t feel this unnatural. “I’m going to take you to Chicago and get you a dose of the cosmopolitan Midwest.”

“Lew, I’ve visited Philadelphia and New York.”

“Troop ship doesn’t count. Oh, and don’t forget gay Paris! You’re a real city swell.”

Dick is indulging him for some reason, but maybe it’s because they’ve made it this far. They’re on top of the god damned Eagle’s Nest for crying out loud. And for a moment they can sit like this, at ease and the sunlight brighter here than it should be. He tells himself that if he isn’t careful, he’ll do something that would be unwished for. 

Fuck it. It’s all ridiculous anyway, and if it doesn’t go according to plan, he’ll just blame it on his present state. He reaches down to slide his fingers through Dick’s already tousled hair and the body beneath him turns rigid.

“I’m sorry-,” he begins, reaching to take his hand away, before Dick’s hand slides up to grasp his wrist gently. 

“Nix,” he says in the voice he uses when addresses the men, and Nix is a goner. “It’s nice. At least we’re not in a foxhole.”

Nix laughs at that, because what else is there to do? So he begins to slowly card his fingers through Dick’s hair while the sun begins to dip below the horizon.

When twilight is well on its way and Nix’s fingers have combed several hundred times, Dick moves to stand up and stretch, looking around haphazardly for his jacket. He turns around and extends one hand to Nix like he would do for any other man in the company. And Nix grasps it, because what else is there to do?

“Chicago,” asks Dick. “Sounds nice.”

“I’ll take you there.” And Dick’s smile is like the sun.

 

**

When they’re finally home, Nix wishes he were almost anywhere else and he begins to work through the plan that he had laid out right before D-Day. He’s short a wife, but he has somehow managed to wrangle back the dog who lurks around him sheepishly and has taken a habit to barking at squirrels. It is February and with the first fall of snow, he feels as if he never left Bastogne. 

He makes plans to escape New Jersey immediately, latching onto Chicago as a lifeline. Dick had given him his telephone number and address on a folded piece of paper right before they had left and now he keeps it folded in his pocket, even though he has already memorized its information. The edges of it have grown smooth and worn from taking it out and tracing his fingers over the ink. 

The plan is for Nix to drive down to Pennsylvania, pick up Dick, and then drive to Chicago for a few days where it hopefully won’t be as cold. At the last minute, he decides to take the German Shepherd, Fitzwilliam, with him out of the sneaking suspicion that Kathy might steal her back during his trip. He never thought that naming the dog after a Jane Austen character was a good idea.

The first thing Dick says to him when he rolls up to the house in Lancaster is not hello, or even a wave or anything so intimate. Instead, it is a quizzically raised eyebrow in the direction of the dog whose pink tongue is lolling in contentment. 

Everything about Dick seems to scream red. His hair is still clipped short and sticks out like a flame amidst the freshly fallen snow and his cheeks look like they have been bedaubed in rouge. There’s a very large crimson knit scarf tied around his neck: homemade probably and by the looks of it, new. A Christmas present, then. 

Nix leans over to roll down the window. “Going my way?”

“Well, you did promise me a trip to Chicago. New dog?” Dick leans over to the window where Fitzwilliam has stuck her head out to investigate the new arrival and he bends down to pat her head. 

“No, I managed to steal the old one back from Kathy. Couldn’t leave her alone in Jersey: she might steal him back. This is Fitz.” The dog proceeds to lick a thin stripe up Dick’s cheek.

“Well, it’s nice to meet you too,” Dick tells Fitz who starts to beat her tail rapidly against Nix’s leg.

“Why don’t you go put your stuff in the trunk before you freeze to death.”

Dick gives him a hint of a smile: the barest quirk of his lips that on any other man would read as displeasure. Yet Nix has grown accustomed to the subtlest of his friend’s expressions, and somehow it reads volumes more than anything else that Dick could have done. This is one of the private looks they would exchange between each other whenever their CO had irrevocably fucked up. Nix knows he is not in Belgium, but the cluster of trees seems too familiar. It feels like the strangest thing in the world to be here. 

When Nix has managed to shoo Fitz out of the front seat and they have taken off down the road, Dick clears his throat and unwinds his scarf. From the corner of his eye, Nix can see that his lips are chapped and the hollow of his throat is a pale pink with a spray of freckles faintly scattered and moving down towards his chest. Somehow talking over the phone was easier, and he is thinking wildly about the bottle of whiskey he has stored in the trunk.

“What’s being home been like?” Dick has never been one to mince words.

“Oh, you know. Nothing’s really changed too much. Dad wants to know when I’m dragging you over to come work with me.” 

“Same old, then?”

“Exactly.” He would kill for a cigarette right now, but it’s too damn cold to open the window and he has gotten used to not shivering and being fired upon by Nazis.

He doesn’t ask Dick what it’s been like being home: the man had already described it to him over the phone and with as much detail as Nix could get out of him as possible. Dick had indulged him, his descriptions as succinct as any of his reports, his voice crackling over the telephone as intimate as any moment they spent whispering in a foxhole.

They drive on in the snow, quietly making idle chit chat for the next few hours before the weather forces them to pull over in Pittsburgh. They find a motel that allows dogs, and then spend an hour downing cups of coffee and steaming bowls of tomato soup at a diner down the road. If Dick notices Nix pouring some of the contents of his flask into his cup, he doesn’t say a word. 

The food warms them up and their conversation moves from the stilted to something like back when they first met: all anxious fumbling on Nix’s part and a desire to impress the quiet young man from Pennsylvania. Dick had originally rejected his offer for a drink and a smoke, but had gradually warmed up to him when Nix had stuck around the base one night and peppered him with questions. Nix was always good with endearing himself to other people, but Winters had been difficult.

When they finally make it back to the hotel, the snowfall has transitioned from light powder to large, fat flakes that do not bode well for the roads. The beds aren’t as comfortable as some of the places they were billeted in Austria, but the sheets are clean. Dick insists on doing calisthenics before he sleeps, asking Nix if he wants to join him just as he has finished brushing his teeth. It feels strange to watch Dick go through the routine while Nix sits around in pajamas and lazily pays attention to Fitz who is growling at the scratching sound in the ceiling. Squirrels, probably. Nix knows he paid too much for the room, but at least it is warm. And Dick is doing pushups like they’re back at Toccoa.

In the morning, they find a different diner with slightly worse and more expensive coffee and then hit the road with a dozen donuts hidden somewhere where Fitz cannot get to them. The donuts are Dick’s idea.

“Didn’t think you cared for sugar, Major Winters.”

“Everyone has their vices, Captain Nixon,” and he looks at Nix pointedly.

After that, their stalemate comes back with all the vengeance of a hangover, so Nix takes to humming. His flask is in the front pocket of his coat and the weight of it feels reassuring, but he supposes he should concentrate on driving. Dick looks out at the road along the side and they drive without talking for almost two hours. 

Somewhere in the middle of Ohio, Dick pulls out the donuts and tells Nix to get off the highway.

“Boston cream, Lew?” His voice comes out muffled by the pink cardboard. It’s the first words that Dick have spoken to him since Pittsburgh.

“Did you get any of the jelly ones? I think I saw a couple of them in the case.”

Dick nods at him and then he plucks one out and hands it to him on a brown paper napkin that doesn’t look like it will stand up to the weight of the fried dough. Nix accepts it with one hand and Dick’s callused palm touches his wrist and a shiver runs up his spine. Get ahold of yourself, you idiot. 

“Lew? Do you remember V-E Day?”

“You mean the day you got me drunk off my ass on bubbly on top of Hitler’s private getaway and some gigantic war ended in the background?” He takes a bite of the donut and the filling comes squirting out.

“Nix.” 

“Yeah, yeah, I remember. I promised you we’d go to Chicago. Jesus, how much do they put in these things anyway?”

He stops talking because Dick has a napkin at the corner of his mouth and is wiping away the fallen jam. His eyebrows have furrowed and his gaze is set upon Nix’s lips, but Dick never does anything by halves and Nix’s imagination has always gotten the better of him when he’s sober.

“It’s fine, I’ve got it,” he says after a moment too long, although when he reaches up with his own napkin, most of the offending jam has gone. 

“So. Chicago? Did you actually plan what we’re going to do when we get there or…?”

“Actually Major Winters, I’ve got the report written up right here, if you’d care to take a look.” He pretends to fumble around for the fake report and his hands brush Dick’s again by the arm rest. He doesn’t move them this time. If he’ll be damned, he’ll do it in the middle of winter in the middle of nowhere Ohio. Better than middle of nowhere France.

“We should go to the Art Institute,” says Dick.

“Didn’t think you were one for paintings.”

“Well, I suppose I didn’t see too many over there. I heard most of them were evacuated. And besides, I don’t think I needed to see the Venus de Milo when you wouldn’t stop telling me about her impossible curves in that foxhole.”

“Oh mon cher, elle est la plus magnifique femme dans tout la belle France.”

“That settles it: you like art. We’ll go.”

“Dick, I don’t want to bore you to death, but I don’t think it’s really your scene.”

“And what’s my scene?”

“A farmhouse surrounded by a donkey, three wise men, and the son of God.”

“Nix,” he sighs and runs his free hand over his hair.

“Alright, we’ll go. I’m not sure you’ll be one for Monet, though.”  
“I don’t think we’ll be much for anything if we don’t get back on the road. I’d hate to get stuck in the snow before we even get there.” 

“And I’m sure you’d figure out a way for us to get out of there, if it came to that.”

“Weren’t you supposed to be the intelligence officer?”  
Nix wants to throw the rest of his donut at him, but he finishes eating it and turns the key in the ignition. They drive on, with Nix’s hand still resting against Dick’s knuckles.

***  
When they finally make it to Chicago, it’s approaching midnight and Nix has a splitting headache. If anything, it is colder here than it was in New Jersey. Dick had taken over driving once they hit Fort Wayne and Nix had begun to divest his flask of its contents. He’s looking forward to finishing the rest in the quiet of the hotel room. The walls are lined in blue paper and the view from their window isn’t half bad. He’s glad to be back in a city, again. He proposes that they order room service before falling asleep with his shoes on.

When he wakes a few minutes before sunrise, Dick is already up and doing calisthenics and by the look of his hair, he has already showered. Typical. Fitz appears to be awake and is watching the motions that Dick makes, her ears perked up in rapt attention. It is with a small laugh that Nix realizes that Fitz stares at Dick the same way she stares at the squirrels that live in the cherry tree. 

“Didn’t mean to wake you, Lew.”

“What time did I fall asleep?” He sits up and starts to rub the grit out of his eyes.

“A few minutes after we got in,” and Dick crouches to do a series of rapid-fire sit-ups.

“You know, Fitz stares at you the same way she stares at squirrels.”

“Well she seemed eager enough to huddle up last night. Think I might have preferred her in the foxhole.”

“I think I was perfectly cuddly enough, thank you very much.”

“Adequate might be more accurate.” 

Nix throws his pillow at him and Dick dodges nimbly and heads towards the bathroom.

“You’ve gotten soft in your old age, Nix,” comes Dick’s voice over the sound of the taps of the sink running.

“Bit of a sight for sore eyes yourself, wouldn’t you say?”

This time when Dick exits the bathroom with a toothbrush in his mouth, the pillow hits him squarely in the stomach before he can retort.

They’re up and at another diner for breakfast by eight, Fitz left in the room with a bone to chew on and the promise of fresh snow. Black coffee and cigarettes are the only things Nix can stomach this morning, as the thought of another round of donuts makes him want to lie down. Dick decides to get oatmeal before Nix comments on his wholesomeness and he switches his order to a plate of eggs, bacon, and toast. Dick stares at him pointedly over the rim of his coffee cup into which he has dumped one packet of cream and two sugars. Nix gives him an arched eyebrow back.

The sun comes bursting through the clouds in the diner and hits the spot behind Dick’s head, so that Nix thinks the universe must enjoy a good practical joke now and again. No wonder they met during a bloody war.

“Didn’t think you’d take our trip so seriously to heart,” he says to Dick, leaning over to steal a rasher. 

Dick looks up confused by the comment, but then passes him the rest of his plate. “What do you mean?”

“If you get even more saintly, they’ll have to hang you on a wall and put you in a gallery.” He gestures with his fork to the glow of the winter sun that is illuminating the tufts of hair behind his ears.

Dick gives him a shrug and wipes his mouth. They leave five minutes later with a couple of bills on the Formica, change rattling with the teaspoons.

In the cold and the wind, Nix is almost afraid that he’ll lose Dick, if not for the scarf that he keeps tucked around his neck like a bright red landmark. He pictures Dick wearing the scarf in the middle of the Ardennes and has to stifle a laugh: his hair had been enough of a beacon. He’s being sentimental and he knows it, so he chooses to tell Dick a story about a party in a friend’s room at Yale involving three bottles of gin and the wife of an eminent classics professor. 

Dick indulges him like he always does, and even laughs in all the right places. All around them, the snow drifts through the air and Nix watches in secret delight as Dick’s ears get redder and redder. When they finally make it to the steps of the Art Institute, Nix has resolved to buy him a hat before they leave.

They don’t linger long looking at the lions, instead choosing to rush up and get inside as quickly as possible. Nix pays for the tickets while Dick goes off to find a coat room. The museum feels like some sort of cavern that they have merely managed to stumble into: it is still early and there are only a few visitors milling about like street pigeons, ruffling the snow off their coats and hats and peering upwards.

“You okay?” Dick comes up behind him, a map in one hand. “You look a little lost.”

“I haven’t been here since I was nineteen. Took a girl here on a date and kissed her in the Impressionist wing. I think it was on the bench in front of the haystacks.”

“Shall we?”

In the first gallery, Nix insists that they go see the Manet, because god only knows that Dick doesn’t cares about mixing up two 19th century French painters. Dick is quiet, his still wet shoes wet squeak against the floor, his posture straight as a bayonet. He goes to sit down in front of the benches where four Manet’s are all lined up. At the center of arrangement is Christ Mocked, the canvas dominating the wall. 

“He used the same models and props for these pictures,” says Nix, sitting down next to Dick. “See the old man with the beard? That’s him with the red beret in the portrait over there.”

A quizzical expression crosses over Dick’s face and he furrows his brows. “So I’m assuming you didn’t kiss her in front of this painting?”

“I think Christ has been laughed at enough, don’t you think?”

Nix keeps up a running commentary on the other works they look at, pointing out the bronze busts of politicians by Daumier by comparing their likenesses to several of Easy’s CO’s. That gets a few laughs from Dick, who otherwise keeps his voice hushed. They spend several minutes engrossed in Caillebotte’s depiction of a rainy afternoon in Paris.

“I think you would have liked the last century, Nix.” He gestures to the grand scenes of circuses, women in long, diaphanous gowns, and scenes of masked balls that line the walls of the museum.

“I’m not so sure. Most of the nineteenth century creatives died of syphilis or were put on trial for some sort of outrage against public morals.”

“Is that why you insisted that I throw roses on Baudelaire’s grave when I visited Paris?”

“Did you?”

“No. I was only there for two days, Lew!”

When they make it to the gallery of candy colored landscapes, Nix feels as if all the air has been punched from his stomach: the haystacks and water lilies seem too real, too vibrant. He looks over to see Dick’s face and his eyes are wide looking at all the color and light. Suddenly his mouth seems to open wider and he seems to be farther away. He doesn’t realize he’s on the floor until the only sensation he can feel is the too fast hammering of his heart and his breath coming in rapid bursts. He hasn’t felt like this since Bastogne and the weight of the flask in his pocket seems to grow even more heavy. 

Dick seems to be so far away, but half a part of him can see Dick picking him up and leading him to one of the smaller galleries. There’s a hand on his wrist, and another rubbing circles into his back and Dick’s voice, slow and gentle. He’s both heard it too often when they were sequestered together huddling for heat, and not often enough now. Dick is so close to him now that he begins to think about how this is the closest they have been since V-E Day. It is not a thought that is proper for a time like this, but what does it matter anyway? His breath is beginning to slow and it is getting easier for him to breathe.

When he opens his eyes, he is face to face with one of Van Gogh’s self-portraits. Even from where he is sitting, he can see the thick buildup of paint and the heavy-lidded eyes seem to acknowledge him. The nose and cheeks are especially ruddy, as if he had painted himself while he had been in his cups. Dick couldn’t have chosen a more appropriate place to bring him in the museum. It’s funny: he looks a little bit like the painter.

“Nix? You alright?” There are two hands on his shoulder and he hasn’t seen this much concern on his face that it almost seems to fill him with nostalgia.

“I think I’m okay. But you brought me into the Van Gogh section? You could have been a little less obvious.”

“Christ Lew, you went out on me like a lamp.” The grip on his shoulders tightens and the lines between his brows get deeper. He should tell Dick to stop that if he doesn’t want to get so many wrinkles. 

“I don’t know, Dick. I-,” he trails off, not quite sure how to continue. “It feels strange to see all of this just lying around…preserved and when I know that’s not what those places look like anymore.” He digs around in his pocket and finally pulls out his flask and takes a long swill: he’s long since gotten used to the burn.

“Lew, we’re in Chicago. Chicago, remember? You promised you’d take me there. And we’re here. We made it, Lew.”

“To fucking Chicago.”

“To fucking Chicago.” He whispers Nix’s words like they’re something holy and not the profanities that seem almost wrong coming from his lips.

If Dick Winters says it’s true, then it probably is. Men followed Major Winters into battle: this was just one more. He moves to stand, Dick still on the ground looking up at him.

“I guess this had to happen at some point.” He can see a trio of confused faces peering in from the larger gallery that then run and vanish. He spots a security guard out of the corner of his eye and gives him a friendly wave. “Good thing it didn’t happen when I was kissing that girl all those years ago.”

“Why don’t we go somewhere more private,” and that’s Dick’s hand on his elbow, steering him out of the gallery. Nix smiles aimlessly at the guard whose mustache seems to bristle with concern.

When Nix finally pays attention to where he is, they’re in an empty gallery of Dutch renaissance paintings, the starched collars are the brightest spots in the room. 

“I’m alright Dick, I’m fine.” He still hasn’t let go of Nix’s elbow and he leads them to a bench in front of a canvas that depicts a number of writhing demons tormenting naked figures. 

“Why this is hell, nor am I out of it,” is out of Dick’s mouth like a prayer. 

“Did you just quote Marlowe at me? What did they teach you in high school?”

Dick gives him a measured look and then his lips are pressed to Nix’s forehead. And Nix is anything if not confused, because if Dick is nervous than nothing can be right. 

It’s easy enough to kiss Dick Winters: a brush of lips and then Nix can taste stale coffee and they’re kissing in the god damn Art Institute like a pair of lovelorn bastards. This is ridiculous and Nix knows it, but somehow it doesn’t feel as awkward as it might be. And Christ, Nix knows that Dick is clever, but this should have happened sooner. When they were in the car or maybe during that champagne interlude in Berchtesgaden.

“How long were you planning on doing that?” He’s slightly breathless, but his gaze is focused intently on him. His skin prickles, because they’re in an art museum and all Dick wants to do is look at him.

“Dick, you weren’t exactly being subtle.” Dick raises one eyebrow at him in an expression that would have Nix laughing if he didn’t look so serious. “Somewhere in Holland,” he says, remembering the bullet that had pinged his helmet and Dick’s hands and voice and everything being too close and too loud.

“Maybe here wasn’t quite the best solution. Someone could have seen.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m the intelligence officer, I should know better. Don’t think they’ll be looking for us after all of…that.” They sit in silence for a moment, close but not touching.

“Are you sure you’re alright?”

“I could kill for a roast beef sandwich and a cigarette right about now.” He knows he’s being evasive purposefully, but he can’t quite bring himself to care. The kiss should have been the answer, but Dick is nothing if not persistent, which in hindsight is probably why he ended up a major. 

“Lew.”

“You know, there’s this painting I kept reading about a few years ago that the museum acquired. A couple of folks in a diner at midnight.” He stands and stretches his legs and holds out a hand to Dick. 

“How big is this place, anyway?” Dick takes his proffered hand and Nix pulls him close and leans to whisper in his ear.

“As big as the whole damn world,” and he takes Dick’s hand and leads him out of the gallery.

They step out into the atrium, and if their bodies are a little closer to each other, trying to enter each other’s orbit, neither one of them comment on it. The light comes streaming in from the ceiling and illuminates the dust in a way that reminds him of Austria where they had too much time on their hands. Now they are here, a whole museum laid out before them and the promise of a few more afternoons in a city that has seemed so far out of reach for too long. Maybe he’ll talk when they get back to the hotel or maybe on the drive back to New Jersey, but for now he’s out of the snow and that is enough.

**Author's Note:**

> This story has been rumbling around in the back of my brain for over a year now and I'm very glad I finlly had the the time to sit down and write it. Many thanks to MH who graciously read several drafts and helped yell with me about the Art Institute.
> 
> As always, any thoughts are appreciated. Thank you for reading! x


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